Filipino Reviews Reviews

Film Review: Pinoy Sunday (2009) by Ho Wi Ding

"Damn rich people"

A couple of days ago, , the director of “” made a post on Facebook stating “Many years ago, after watching the premiere of my feature debut PINOY SUNDAY, a European programmer warned me that, many years later, I won't be proud of this film enough to include it in my filmography. Twelve years later, PINOY SUNDAY is still in demand, showing in small non-profit venues like schools or film festivals, within Taiwan or abroad. Last year, it was screened in the 48th Seoul Independent Film Festival. Next Wednesday, January 11th, at 8pm, it will be screened again in Oldham Theater of Asian Film Archive. A film without expiry date. Yes. Many years later, I am still proud of Pinoy Sunday.”

The aforementioned comment was actually the instigation for me to watch the film, with the answer in the question of why the European programmer made that comment, coming pretty early in the movie: it is a film about poor overseas immigrants that is not of the misery porn variety. Let us take things from the beginning though.

Dado Tagalog and Manuel dela Cruz are two overseas Filipino workers employed by Giant Bicycles in Taiwan. They are poor and struggle in Taiwan as they want to send money back home, while having to face a rather strict system that prevents workers from attending their work if they are even slightly late, while three “strikes” lead to firing. Dado has a wife and daughter back home, but is also dating a personal care assistant named Anna. When some bad news comes from the Philippines, however, he starts to feel guilty about his stance. Manuel is desperately trying to find a girlfriend, frequently daydreaming about the fact, with his latest “target” being a club hostess named Cecilia, who gave him her number on a night he attended the club she worked at. Expectedly, his wish does not go as he planned.

While both are down due to their respective issues, and even more so after a former colleague is fired and subsequently arrested, they stumble upon a Taiwanese couple arguing over a red couch that is delivered on their doorstep. When the couple and delivery workers abandon the couch, Manuel sees it as a sign from God and decides that he and Dado bring it back to their dormitory. Thus begins a true odyssey through the streets of the city.

Ho Wi Ding directs what is essentially a road movie, which aims at highlighting the everyday lives of Filipino immigrants in Taiwan, in a way that remains light, funny, and entertaining throughout while still managing to be quite pointed in its remarks. As such, the majority of episodes and characters here seem to aim at exactly that. The racism immigrants have to face, the hardships of living in dorms and working under rather strict conditions, even including a curfew, the issue of language, the role of the press, the difficulty of both making relationships and retaining the ones back home are all eloquently portrayed in the movie, in a style that is quite realistic despite its lack of melodrama. The way a couch eventually ends up symbolizing the “Taiwanese Dream” is a testament to the overall contextual approach here, and a rather entertaining “prop” that essentially functions as the base of the movie.

Also of note here is the antithesis of the protagonists, with Manuel being the cool and smooth one and Dado the loud, whining one, despite the fact that both are actually pretty similar as individuals, as their attitude towards the couch reveals. This aspect is one of the main sources of comedy, as much as the main medium of the comment regarding friendship, also benefiting the most by the acting of as Dado and as Manuel, both of which give performances that are in perfect resonance with the movie's aesthetics.

Talking about the couch, Ho Wi Ding uses it in a style that reminds of “The Old Man and the Sea” in a very smart narrative approach, while its intensely vivid color works quite well for the visuals of the movie, with Jake Pollock's cinematography capturing the overall setting with realism and artistry, and the red of the coach creating a very appealing antithesis with the bleakness of the urban setting the two protagonists roam. Hsu Wei-Yao's editing results in a relatively fast pace that suits the episodic style of the narrative nicely, while at 84 minutes, the movie definitely does not overextend its welcome, even if the amount of the episodes is a bit hyperbolic.

“Pinoy Sunday” is not high art, at least as European festivals have come to define the term, but it is fun, entertaining, realistic, and quite eloquent in its comments, and an overall very nice piece of cinema that also seems to stand the test of time.

About the author

Panos Kotzathanasis

My name is Panos Kotzathanasis and I am Greek. Being a fan of Asian cinema and especially of Chinese kung fu and Japanese samurai movies since I was a little kid, I cultivated that love during my adolescence, to extend to the whole of SE Asia.

Starting from my own blog in Greek, I then moved on to write for some of the major publications in Greece, and in a number of websites dealing with (Asian) cinema, such as Taste of Cinema, Hancinema, EasternKicks, Chinese Policy Institute, and of course, Asian Movie Pulse. in which I still continue to contribute.

In the beginning of 2017, I launched my own website, Asian Film Vault, which I merged in 2018 with Asian Movie Pulse, creating the most complete website about the Asian movie industry, as it deals with almost every country from East and South Asia, and definitely all genres.

You can follow me on Facebook and Twitter.

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